Apple’s assemblers prepare for iPhone 6 with huge hiring spree

Foxconn and Pegatron — the two leading manufacturers set to produce the iPhone 6 — have been on a massive hiring spree as of late.

According to Taiwan’s Economic Daily News, Foxconn will recruit in excess of 100,000 new workers in mainland China to help assemble Apple’s much-anticipated next generation iPhone. It had previously been reported that the company was opening up new factory space to carry out the work.

Rival Taiwanese assembler Pegatron will also be upping the workforce in one of its factories by 30 percent in order to meet the demand the influx of new work will place on it.

Foxconn is reported to be handling 70 percent of the production duties on the iPhone 6, while Pegatron will handle the remaining 30 percent. Previous speculation had put Pegatron’s reported role in the assembly process down as far as 15 percent, and as large as 50 percent.

Mass production of the devices is set to commence next month, in time for a September launch.

While there’s been (unsurprisingly) no official confirmation from Apple, most people are expecting the iPhone 6 to come in two sizes: a 4.7-inch model and a larger, more expensive 5.5-inch “phablet” variant.

About the author:

Luke Dormehl is a UK-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems, And Create More and The Apple Revolution, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme, and other publications. He'd like you a lot if you followed him on Twitter.